1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus, an information processing method, and a computer program which perform processes of recording and reproducing contents, and particularly to an information processing apparatus, an information processing method, and a computer program which aid content processing such as TV program recording, preselected recording, and playback.
More specifically, in consideration of the nature of TV program watching that is passive entertainment, the invention relates to an information processing apparatus, an information processing method, and a computer program which provide information that aids content operations such as TV program search, preselected recording, and playback, and particularly to an information processing apparatus, an information processing method, and a computer program which provide information that aids content operations such as TV program search, preselected recording, and playback, without deadening a user's interest inspired by watching a TV program.
2. Description of Related Art
In modern information civilization society, the role of broadcasts is immeasurable. Most of all, TV broadcasts have a great influence, which directly deliver video information to audiences as well as sounds. Broadcasting techniques include a wide variety of techniques such as signal processing and sending and receiving signals, and information processing of sounds and video. Furthermore, the transmission form that provides program contents to users is in various forms such as a broadcast mode and a cable TV mode by radio waves including ground waves and satellite waves, and network programs offered by using computer communications.
The ownership rate of TV sets is extremely high, and the TV sets are installed in almost all houses. The broadcast contents distributed from individual broadcast stations are watched by an indefinite number of people. Moreover, for another form of watching the broadcast contents, the received contents may be temporarily recorded on the audience side to play it back at any time when desired.
In recent years, with the development of digital techniques, audiovisual data formed of video and sounds can be stored in mass volume. For example, an HDD (hard disk drive) having a capacity of a few tens of GB or greater is available at relatively low cost, and an HDD-based recorder and a personal computer (PC) having functions of recording and watching TV programs are coming.
The HDD is a device that can make random access to recorded data. Therefore, when recorded contents are played back, recorded programs do not need to be sequentially played back from the start as in the case of traditional videotape, and a desired program (or, a certain scene and a certain part in a program) can be directly started for playback. It is called a ‘server-type broadcast’ which is a watching form that a receiver (a TV set or a video record/playback device) mounted with a large-capacity storage such as a hard disk device is used, and received broadcast contents are temporarily stored in the receiver for playback.
According to the server-type broadcast system, it allows real time watching such as watching with a typical TV set as well as watching in such ways that video and sounds are distributed beforehand to watch them from the specified time and that information distributed at the same time is used to do scene search or watch a digest.
However, with the realization of the large-capacity HDD, in a system that allows program recording for a few tens of hours, a user can vacillate on selecting which program to watch first when many programs are stored. Then, contents will be a dead stock unless a program that the user desires to watch is efficiently selected to record it or to preselect recording it to aid the user to watch the stored contents. A recording device stores a large volume of the recorded contents therein, and it is difficult to watch all the contents. Thus, selecting is necessary. More specifically, it is considered that efficient preselected recording operations are important for users to enjoy useful activity of watching TV programs.
Here, a so-called electronic program guide (EPG) system is known in which a program guide for selecting programs of television broadcasts is superimposed on a picture signal for transmission, and is displayed on a display device on the receiver side. On the record/playback device side such as an HDD recorder, the EPG is obtained in parallel with recording processing of a broadcast program, and the EPG is shown when a user plays back and watches the recorded program. Therefore, certain watching aid effect can be obtained.
The EPG system has systems of the VBI (Vertical Blanking Interval) mode (for example, see JP-T-6-504165 (U.S. Pat. No. 5,353,121), and the digital satellite mode (for example, see JP-A-111823) that is used in digital satellite broadcast (DSS) (the trademark of Hughes Communication).
In the VBI mode, in television broadcasts of the typical ground wave (VHF (Very High Frequency) band), VBI data configuring the EPG is inserted at the position where an original image of the horizontal scanning lines is not influenced for transmission. On the receiver side, display data of the electronic program guide can be created from the VBI data to display it on a monitor. Furthermore, in the digital satellite mode, EPG data is digitized together with original image data, and is further formed in a packet for transmission. On the receiver side, the EPG data is stored in memory, and corresponding display data is created to display it on a monitor.
A user refers to the EPG distributed as accompanying programs, and then the user specifies or estimates a program desired to watch. However, in this case, it is necessary for the user to do complicated operations in such a way that the user first activates the EPG and searches a program desired to watch on the EPG screen for selection.
For example, when a user desires to search and record a program having high relativity to the program being watched such as the next broadcast program and a program in which the same actor/actress appears, based on the interest inspired in watching a recorded program (or a program now being broadcast), the user needs to activate an EPG screen for search based on days in a week and channels among many programs, or search according to titles and names of cast. In this case, the user needs to suspend watching a TV program to do a search operation for the program to be recorded.
Moreover, program related information is often provided on an official web site of the program through a medium such as the Internet. However, in order to browse detail information, complicated operations need to be done in such a way that a web browser is activated to enter a URL, and thus the interest to the TV program inspired through watching is diverted.
Watching TV programs inherently has the nature of passive entertainment. On the other hand, searching for a program to be preselected for recording requires users to do active operations, causing the interest inspired by watching programs to be deadened by the program search operations.